Peppermint
by CyborgRockStar
Summary: Quirky oneshot, vignette, KaiYuriy, filled with pain and something remotely close to fluff.... Thank you for reviewing!


Disclaimer: I don't own Beyblade; it belongs to Aoki Takao.

**Peppermint**

Peppermint. His apartment always smells like peppermint. I don't know why, but it does, no matter what.

So I sit here, living due to peppermint-stained air, staring at the clock on the wall. Its ebony hands point out the time of 3:34.

3:34 AM, and I'm sitting here, in his apartment, faint moonlight the only lighting.

Blood-red is the color of the flower in my hand. Red…the color of his hair. The flower is a rose, green stem complementing its crimson petals, thorns lining the entirety of the green. And here and there is the odd leaf.

My fingers—pale and deprived of sunshine—are wrapped gently around the green, avoiding any prickles.

Prickles…thorns…on this rose…like that saying:

"Every rose has its thorns"

And that's so true to existence…so true for his existence.

Thorns…they cover him, scathe him…and that hurts me.

He is a beautiful creature, with that flaming red hair, those crystal-blue eyes, his slender, strong frame, his proficiency in anything, his passion for nothing other than me. And never has either of us experienced such rich, delicious, confusing feelings before…but we do like them.

My beautiful love…he sees himself in a different light than the rest of the world. He sees himself as unworthy of me, nothing more than a blemish on my perfect complexion.

But it's quite the opposite…I am his flaw, his mistake, unworthy of the grace his presence brings.

Why does he see himself as such?

I do not know. And that's why I'm here.

Sitting here, breathing in the stench of peppermint, watching the hands on the clock drain precious moments of life away, holding a delicate rose between two fingers.

Life…going by.

It doesn't wait for anyone.

3:34 AM.

…3:35 AM.

…3:36 AM.

Time doesn't wait, not for anyone, not for you, him, or me.

And I don't want to wait for him, either.

I'm not sure where he is in this apartment…locked up in a room somewhere, I suppose.

Does he know I'm here?

I announced my entrance when he did not answer his door.

Surely he's here…. Where else could he be?

I scowl at my stupidity.

Why had I not checked to see if he was around?

Slowly, I lift myself, rose in hand, and wander about the apartment.

Roses…such fragile blessings in the world. Perhaps they are an overrated gift, though, one girls receive from their boyfriends... But I'm no idiot with a crush.

I'm in love.

And he loves me back.

And that's why I'm here at 3:36 AM.

3:36 AM.

…3:37 AM.

I stop ambling about in front of the coffee table next to the sofa I had been seated upon. I haven't even bothered looking at it, despite the many occasions I've been here, in his apartment, in this main room.

On it is one picture…a photograph. Of me. And him.

Together.

The way we were and are supposed to be.

Happy, smiling, touching….

An onlooker could see this relationship of ours and the emotions we display in it uncharacteristic, as us straying from our personalities. But in actuality, this how we are inside…. This is the innocence and purity and love that fights against the chains our prior training at Balkov Abbey has restrained us with.

Happy, smiling, touching….

It's who I want to be.

And who I need to be…with him.

So where is he?

Doesn't he need me too?

Surely….

I sit back down.

No, he's not here. How foolish of me not to notice, how moronic….

But I can't do that. I can't bring myself down. He's shown me that better than anyone else in the world has: He's shown me I'm a person, that I have value…and that I'mpriceless to him.

And he's shown me so much more, taught me things the like of which I didn't think were possible for me to discover. He's given me these feelings of acceptance, of love, of an alien mirth so different to anything I've encountered before….

He's given my life a real meaning, a true purpose…. I now live for him, to see him and hold him and be with him when I'm needed.

And he lives for me.

But where is he now?

Sometimes, I could just slap myself, pull myself back to reality: No matter how much I want to be this person he's dug up from the depths of my soul, I know I'm not truly that person. I'm conceited, strong-willed, callous in many ways but also perhaps a little caring is there, somewhere…on top of all, I'm _weak-minded_.

Oh, how I wish against anything and everything that I am not weak.

**But I am**.

And that's the truth that I can't escape.

If I were strong, I would be able to support him and his burdens, as well as my own. If I were strong, I would be able to create a brilliant life for the two of us to share. If I were strong, I wouldn't be here right now….

But maybe he's the same way…maybe he's a different person than who I see when we're happy, smiling, touching….

_Click. _

_Swish._

I turn my head, and my violet gaze rests upon _him_, standing in the doorway, door swung aside, staring at me.

And that stare…I dislike it.

It's not him, not who he wants to be and not who is he deep down.

The crystal-azure pools that I'm looking into are listless, dull, with the slightest hinting of sorrow.

Our eyes interlock…but not in one of those treasured moments of passion. This one is a mush of confusion, a mess of unclearness.

He whispers my name, in a voice void of its usual crispness, now housing…what's that?

_Pain_…

I stand, non-too-swiftly, and advance toward him with gradual fluidity. He steps closer, carelessly closing the door behind him.

He looks away, breaks our eye contact, and eyes the rose, questioning why I have it aloud. His voice is the same as his eyes...

I tell him it's for him…a small offering that bares my soul.

Quizzically, he gazes up at me, our eyes meeting once again. And, once again, is that muss of obscurity….

Silence reigns the planes of our mouths, disallowing speech of any sort. I do not know how to respond to his look…how to answer his unspoken question of why this rose is significant in any way.

How can I say it?

I stutter, stammer, words tumbling ungraciously from my mouth…and it makes me feel rather foolish that I'm speaking such gibberish.

Finally, I manage to utter what's on my mind, muster up the will and words to tell him…

_Every rose has its thorns_. To tell him that he is becoming distant, that I'm worried, that we all have flaws….

'We all have flaws'…

This, coming from me, who strove for perfection at all costs….

Yes, he has changed me, very much.

And now it's time for me to change him.

This rare treat of me saying precisely what's on my heart is not something witnessed by any regular person…and he knows this. Hopefully, he will take into consideration the fact that I hold him high enough in respect and love that I am willing to dump the contents of my heart on a table for him to dissect.

He takes the rose from me and ogles it absently, twisting it round between his fingers. One of the thorns pricks him, and he is unable to suppress the wince of shock at the sting. Blood, the color of the rose, wells up against the tiny, tiny speck of injury on his finger…and he watches it while I watch him.

Eyes are so betraying of emotion, if one is not careful. And he is being quite careless if he wishes to block me out of his spectrum of feeling.

…But I have an impulse that he desires no such thing…and wants to let me in.

Blue depths sparkle with pain, shimmer with sadness, glitter with _unshed tears_.

I don't know what to say, what to do….

Though he makes the first move.

He says my name softly…looks up into my eyes, and violet interlocks with azure again…we delve into the other's soul, double-checking for trust and sincerity….

And seemingly, he finds these inside of me.

For the next thing I know, his arms are around me, embracing me. I wrap my arms around his body gently, and stare at the red back of his head.

Again he mumbles my name…and I relish in the sound, despite the fact that it is muffled by my clothing and filled with sorrow. How I love to hear his voice...though such pain stirs up sadness in me, coming from my love...

...So now, here I stand…

…time ticking away in its continual cycle, not waiting for any stragglers to catch up…

3:37 AM.

…3:38 AM.

…3:39 AM.

…3:40 AM.

…3:41 AM.

…breathing in the spicy, sweet smell of peppermint that lingers in the air, clings to him obsessively…

…auburn rose lying, forsaken, on the floor, between us, symbolic to life and proving famous expressions true…

…holding him, Yuriy Ivanov, in my arms tightly, closely, while he struggles against his inner demons, a battle the world will never see, but I can feel a fragment of,and still he radiates love and passion for me…

…and if I had a choice, this is where I'd stay forevermore, breathing peppermint and holding him.

**End.**

Okay…sort of random. This was the pointless result of a FanFiction Musing Session of mine. But I like it. Hope you do too.

Thank you for reading, please review!

have a nice day

CyborgRockStar


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